Bad Mood
by Jojo6
Summary: S/J as per my usual. Just kind of a promise for the future. Season six spoilers. PG-13 for perhaps one swear word


Spoilers: S6 coz of McKay, but it's before 'Frozen'. Um, quite what got into Sam in this fic is beyond me. I just think the girl needs to be a little more angry with her situation. 

PS. I know nothing about computers. So just go with whatever I throw at you. I have a really bad cold and am in no mood to research properly. Shocking lack of professionalism, I know. 

PPS. This _totally_ came out of nowhere, by the way. And there will be no sequel. 

Disclaimer: Stargate SG-1 is an original MGM, Greenburg/Anderson, Gekko, Top Secret, Kawoosh! production. Any material relating to Stargate SG-1 is for entertainment only, and is in no way meant as an infringement on copyrights. In other words, I own nadda. 

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This couldn't be happening. Was it too unreasonable to expect that the one night, the one damn night, when she actually took her downtime, when she actually went home, got ready for her first date in YEARS, with a guy she didn't hate, didn't remind her of Colonel O'Neill and didn't have a god complex.... 

Wait, hold on, where was that line of thought going? 

Oh, yeah, she was angry. Really angry. Really pissed off with the universe for spoiling the first hint of a life she'd had in, oh yes, YEARS. 

She'd said yes to McKay. 

It had taken her nearly two weeks to get used to the fact that she'd said yes. That when he'd called, told her he was going to be in town for some scientist dinner event and maybe, just maybe, possibly, would she like to go with him? 

For two minutes, Sam had been silent. He'd called her at a vulnerable time. The Colonel had just returned from a week's downtime at his cabin. The cabin. The fishing cabin. The cabin he had not invited her too. The first time he'd not invited her down there. Miserably, Sam had become aware that he was getting over her. And she was in no way getting over him, after all, he may have 'cared about her' or whatever, but she'd been in love with him since Edora. 

Damned bloody Edora. 

So she'd said yes. 

**Yes**. 

To McKay. 

But here she was, in a cab with McKay, being driven _back_ to Cheyenne after her pager had urgently gone off (in the middle of some really tedious speech, actually) informing her that there was some massive computer crisis going on and her expertise was needed. Right now. 

The thing was, she'd actually been having a nice time. Despite the regret she'd felt over letting McKay talk her into a formal event, on an actual date with him, things had started off good and were definitely heading towards great when her damned pager started sending her little evening bag shooting off the table. 

He'd brought her flowers. Pink roses. '' I thought red would be a little... obsessive.'' He'd grinned sheepishly, looked at her properly. '' You know, you look beautiful. But you must get that a lot.'' 

She got that _never_. Oh, wait, unless she got it from potential kidnappers. Joy of joys. 

And she'd felt beautiful. And it was so wonderful to feel attractive. For the first time in, here we go again, YEARS, she'd not been covered in mud/dirt/blood/dust/sand, she wasn't wearing BDUs that made her ass look fat, her waist disappear and her breasts look unimpressive. She felt like a woman, a normal woman, out on a normal date with a normal (okay, slightly crazy) guy who'd brought her a perfect bunch of flowers and said she looked beautiful. And he wasn't an alien either. 

For God's sake, the guy had made her blush. She'd lost all of her coolness factor away from the base. Suddenly, he was the guy and she was the girl. She wasn't a Major in the USAF who had more Stargate experience than he'd had hot dinners (okay, a little exaggeration). And he wasn't someone trying to usurp her position. He'd called her an artist, engaged her in a conversation, given her professional compliments - admittedly, the first time they'd met he'd called her a dumb blonde but he was only being defensive - and, for the first time in ages, a guy didn't seem to be unnerved by her. 

In her line of work, men were always just a little unnerved by her. She was, well, weird. It didn't help that most people in the SGC knew she'd been possessed by a range of alien entities and her father was now an alien too. 

So they'd gone to the dinner. They'd talked to other scientists, both of them had chanted that their work was 'classified' which had only made them more popular as various brainboxes tried to trick them into spilling their information. The food had been great, the wine plentiful. There'd even been some dancing briefly before the speeches began and he'd made her laugh on the dance floor, taught her some swish dancing moves that he'd sheepishly admitted his mother had taught him when he was ten. 

Then the pager had gone off. 

Next to her in the cab, McKay nudged her gently. '' Anyway, the speeches were only going to be boring,'' he told her. 

She smiled wanly. That wasn't the point. 

At the check-in, they got out of the cab, paid the driver and flashed their IDs at the guard before walking along the pedestrian walk, side by side, both just a touch melancholy. Sam wrapped her arms about her black full length coat as a chill wind whipped up around her. 

'' This must happen a lot,'' McKay said casually. 

'' It does. But I'm usually here.'' In fact, usually it was her paging everyone else. 

'' Oh. Sorry.'' 

They came to a halt at the elevator and she touched his hand. '' No. I'm glad I was out. I was... I really enjoyed myself.'' 

He grinned, stuck his hands into his tux jacket and scuffed a foot against the pavement. '' Me too.'' 

The elevator pinged and they both got inside, grinning stupidly. 

The only downside in Sam's thoughts had been the stray notion that if he'd been Colonel O'Neill, she would have been on Cloud Nine instead of surprisingly cheerful. 

Level 28 was in a state of upheaval. Sam had had the idea of changing into her BDUs once she arrived but the sight of marines and airmen running maniacally all over the place and klaxons blaring urgently in the corridors put an end to that thought. Unconsciously, she started running, McKay by her side, as they headed towards the control room. 

'' Major, nice of you to join us,'' Colonel O'Neill commented caustically as she came into view. His eyes took in McKay following in her footsteps and his eyebrows rose. '' And McCoy.'' 

'' McKay,'' Sam corrected him absently, going straight to the main terminal where Lieutenant Simmons was frantically trying to access the computer. '' What's going on?'' 

'' All I can think of is it's a virus, Major,'' Simmons managed weakly as she leaned by him. His eyes roamed to her earrings and choker, then to the sparkly things she'd stuck in her hair. Then he breathed in deeply. '' Yeah. A virus.'' 

She gave him a very odd look. 

'' A virus?'' McKay grabbed a computer and started tapping away at the keyboard. '' You've got to be kidding me. The security programmes on this thing are a miracle.'' 

'' Thank you,'' Sam said, managing a smile. She tried several different ways to access the computer mainframe, her brow furrowing as each way was blocked. '' McKay?'' 

'' I got nothing.'' 

'' All right. Have you tried shutting down the power manually?'' 

Simmons shook his head. '' The Colonel wanted to wait to see what you thought.'' 

She nodded - just as well, sometimes these things could be fixed without taking drastic measures. After all, they'd lose a great deal of information by turning off the power. '' We'll reboot and see if that works. This shouldn't have happened, Colonel.'' 

'' It did, Major. How?'' 

'' When exactly did the problem start?'' McKay demanded, leaning back in his chair and regarding the standing Colonel. 

'' About ten minutes before I had you paged.'' He rubbed at the back of his neck. '' No off-world activations, no teams leaving or coming... it came out of nowhere.'' 

Sam glanced at McKay and he nodded. '' It's got to be internal,'' he said. '' Maybe... deliberate.'' 

She winced, unfortunately that had been exactly what she'd been thinking. Hopefully, someone had just popped in an infected floppy disk on one of the internal computers without running it through computer security first. '' Colonel? Manual shut down? Give it a minute or two after shutting it down before turning back on.'' 

He made a face. '' Simmons, come on. And Major, perhaps when I get back, you could be changed into something a little more appropriate?'' 

Blinking, she stared at his turned back. Then she looked down at her perfectly respectable winter coat, at the inch of bare ankle and her black strappy sandals. Appropriate? Okay, so she wasn't in uniform, but it was a crisis situation. 

When he was ought of earshot, she exclaimed, '' _What?_'' 

The rest of the room looked as bemused as she was. 

McKay shrugged. '' Probably pissed about having his night ruined too.'' 

'' But he was here before it all started.'' She glanced at her watch. '' At just after eleven. Oh well, he can be in a mood sometimes for inexplicable reasons. I'm not going to get changed just because he's in a bad mood.'' She sat down at the computer and started unbuttoning her coat, shrugged out of it and wiggled her shoulders. Down in the gate room, she saw the Colonel and Graham Simmons approach the manual shut down levers. Recalling what had happened last time - even if it had been alien orientated - she ordered everyone to back away from any electrical devices and nodded to Colonel O'Neill. 

Both men pulled the levers at the same time and suddenly the noisy hum of major computers ceased, died. There was blissful silence. Then, almost too quickly, the humming began again, the beeping sound of rebooting computers all over the control room, the whine of loading programmes, the whirr of fans. Smiling, Sam looked over at McKay. 

'' Ah, music to my ears,'' he murmured. 

She grinned. '' Quite.'' 

Then their eyes turned to the computer screens. 

The bounding of feet on the staircase heralded Colonel O'Neill's arrival. '' Any change?'' 

Sam winced as the screen stuck, the she lowered her face onto her hands and rubbed. '' No.'' 

'' Now what?'' he demanded. '' Have you just made it worse, Major?'' 

As far as Sam was concerned, that was unnecessary. '' No, sir. It just means... well, it means..'' 

'' Since we don't know what's wrong, we're going to have to completely wipe the hard drives,'' McKay sighed. '' And re-programme everything.'' 

'' That's bad, isn't it?'' 

'' Not that bad. Information is backed up every few hours. We'll only loose the information between the back-ups. And all the procedures and programmes are on disk.'' She shrugged. '' It'll just be a long and tedious job, sir.'' 

'' I'm feeling the urge for buckets of coffee coming on,'' McKay commented, standing up and shrugged out of his tux jacket. He looked over at the Colonel. '' Don't worry. Sam and I'll oversee everything. It'll be all back to normal tomorrow morning.'' 

'' Do we have teams off-world, Colonel?'' 

The Colonel scowled at her like it was all her fault. '' No one's due back until tomorrow afternoon.'' He put his hands in his pockets. '' Well? What are you waiting for? Get on with it!'' 

Damn, he really was in a bad mood, Sam thought, getting up and going straight for one of the three backup cupboards. 

Two hours later his mood hadn't improved. And his bad temperedness was aimed almost entirely at Sam which, while not unusual (she was his second in command, after all), she rather thought it was a tad cruel considering she'd come directly to the SGC when paged, away from the life he had on many occasions ordered her to find. At one point, she almost asked to know why he was still hanging around in the control room when they all knew his computer expertise was limited to Windows 2000. Then she decided that if she valued her life she'd take a gulp of lukewarm coffee and keep her mouth shut. 

'' Is he always like this?'' McKay muttered as they began the slow, tedious, mind-numbingly boring process of uploading every piece of software needed to dial the gate. 

'' No. I don't know what got into him. He was perfectly cheerful when I left today. Praised me for leaving for a change.'' 

McKay took her mug from her, sniffed it, tilted the liquid towards his mouth and then hurriedly removed the mug from his mouth. '' Oh, man, that's revolting. It's cold.'' 

'' It's your turn to get some more,'' she pointed out, sweeping an arm under her skirt to protect it as she sat down. 

'' As I recall, Graham, sucker that he is, fetched your round simply because you batted your eyelashes at him.'' 

Sam glared at him and refused to look at the blushing Lieutenant who was trying to be invisible in the corner. 

McKay gave in with a smile and his palms in the air. '' All right, all right. I don't suppose it would work for me, would it, Colonel?'' 

Colonel O'Neill, watching the two of them narrowly, lifted up his magazine and refused to comment. 

Sam rolled her eyes and turned back to the computer screen as McKay got out of the firing range. Suddenly, the loading screen stopped. '' Ah!'' she yelped in horror. 

Colonel O'Neill jumped up and came to stand by her, one large, warm hand going to her bare right shoulder. '' What?'' 

'' Faulty disk. You've got to be kidding me,'' Sam snapped at the screen. She stood up, nearly crashed into the Colonel (he was a lot closer than she'd thought he was) and only stopped herself by planting her palms on his chest. Underneath her hand, she could feel his heart pounding. 

'' Faulty disk? Is that it?'' He sighed, shoulders slumping and eyes closing. '' Shit. I thought you'd been electrocuted.'' 

She opened her mouth to tell him that wasn't possible, when she realised exactly what he must have been reliving. Despite herself - and the urgent need she had to get to the other backup disk and start over - she swallowed painfully and set about calming him down. '' No, it's not that,'' she said gently, aware that that computer entity experience had not only been horrible for her, but for him as well. She patted her hands against his chest, reassuringly, she hoped. '' I just need to get another backup disk.'' For some reason, though, she didn't appear to be moving. And her hands were still on him. His hand was still on her. 

He looked down at her, as in _down _down, smiled faintly. '' Nice dress, Carter.'' 

It was the first time he'd used her surname all evening. He'd pointedly used 'Major' whenever he'd barked orders at her. She supposed this was his way of apologising for being an ass. '' Thanks. Must be weird.'' 

'' What?'' 

'' Seeing me in a dress.'' 

'' I've seen you in a dress before, Carter.'' And his broad grin triggered that memory like his words hadn't. 

'' Oh... crap,'' she muttered. '' I still have that. Somewhere.'' 

His mouth dropped open, effectively removing the lascivious grin. '' No way.'' 

'' Yes, way. It's in my quarters, actually. Must dig it out for Halloween. Spending it with my niece and nephew, this year. Auntie Sam always has to have the most impressive costume.'' 

'' Right, I'm back. And I bring coffee.'' 

Around them, there were simultaneous groans of appreciation as the techs all stood like zombies and zoomed over to McKay. Reluctantly, Sam pulled her hands away from her CO. '' McKay,'' she called, '' I'm going down to my office. The backup disk is faulty.'' 

'' Shit, no kidding?'' 

'' No kidding.'' She waggled her eyebrows at him and accepted the coffee he offered her. '' See you in a minute. Don't... play with anything.'' 

'' Cute, blondie, really cute.'' 

She grinned helplessly and hurried off to the elevator. This was turning into the weird evening. No, morning, she thought, glancing at her watch. It wasn't her usual watch. No, not in this dress. This dress called for something a little more feminine that Velcro and plastic. This watch was a beautiful silver creation that had been her mother's and she was naturally very protective of it. 

'' Hey, Carter, wait up.'' 

Sam slowed, turned and smiled at the Colonel. '' Had enough of the control room?'' 

'' All those computer whizzes. Gave me the heeby-jeebies.'' 

'' The heeby-jeebies,'' she repeated, finding the words somewhat bizarre coming out of his mouth. 

'' Yes. That's what I said. And I'm sticking by it.'' 

'' Whatever floats your boat.'' 

'' Flies your _plane_, Carter. _Flies your plane_. We're in the _Air Force_.'' 

She rolled her eyes and stepped into the elevator. She stared down at the slit in her skirt as they waited for the floor of her lab. When she glanced up at him, she found he was also staring at the slit in her skirt. He caught her eye and hurriedly looked up at the ceiling. 

Huh, Sam thought. That was weird, right? Normally, his eyes didn't stray from her face. Course, normally she wore the ugliest clothes man had ever made and showed off nothing about her figure. He just wasn't used to seeing so much of her. 

The second set of backup disks were in her office and she knew all of them were working fine since she often played with them on her downtime. Sad, yes, but she was kinda glad about it now. 

She dialled in the code of the cupboard in and opened the doors, running her eyes up and down the numerous disks she kept stored in there. 

'' Wow,'' the Colonel murmured, looking over her shoulder. His chin brushed her shoulder. 

'' I know. For some reason most of the staff ask me to keep their disks in here. It may have something to do with the fact that I'm usually on base, rain or shine,'' she added thoughtfully, reaching out running a finger down the white labels of a particular rack, searching for the right one. 

'' You weren't tonight.'' 

'' No. And look how well that ended up.'' 

'' So... you and McKay go out a lot?'' 

She smiled, turned to look at him. Man, he really was close, wasn't he? she thought as she came face to face with his eyes. She had this _thing_ for brown eyes that was bordering on obsessive. '' No. Tonight was the first time.'' 

'' Oh.'' Casually, he reached past her waist and grabbed a luminous pink CD-ROM. '' What's this?'' 

'' That's Captain Haversay's.'' She tapped a finger on the label. '' Photos of her kids, I think.'' 

'' Haversay, Haversay...'' 

With a wry smile, Sam helped him out. '' She's commonly referred to as the babe on SG-9.'' 

Colonel O'Neill laughed. '' Oh. Her!'' 

'' For God's sake,'' she muttered. '' Men.'' 

'' Oh, come off it. I know you women are just as bad with the men. What about Dr Gradley?'' 

'' Please, he is a work of art and is not to be messed with.'' She giggled as she felt his laughter shake the body behind her. '' Hold this,'' she ordered, passing him a trio of zip disks. She might as well get the backups for all the programmes, just in case she was faced with the same problems with the others. 

Holding the disks obediently in both his hands, he sighed, fluttering the hair at her nape. '' I like this.. thing you've got going on top of your head.'' 

Busying herself by searching for the ever elusive basic programme disk, Sam tried to sound cool, despite the fact that he was practically holding her in his arms whilst complimenting her at the same time. Her fantasy life was sure going to go into overdrive the next time to she went to sleep. '' You mean my hair?'' 

'' Yeah.'' Shuffling the disks into one hand, he lifted his right and touched one of the crystals. '' Are they glued in?'' 

'' No. They've got wires. They're Cassie's, actually,'' she admitted, somewhat sheepishly. After all, Cassie had all but dressed Sam for the evening, which was just a little embarrassing. 

'' They're great. Can I take one out?'' 

She laughed and her fingers pounced, paused. No, dammit, where was it? '' Sure, go for it.'' 

Carefully, gently, he untangled one of the hair crystals, which made Sam uncomfortably aware of what his close proximity was doing to her body. The hand and arm came back around her body and she looked down as he looked down over her shoulder. '' Clever little buggers,'' he muttered. 

'' Want some for Christmas?'' 

'' Cute, Carter. Must have been a fancy do, then.'' 

'' Formal. Hence the dress.'' His head came down and rested on her shoulder. Sam swallowed and hoped he didn't hear. 

Okay, this was seriously weird. He was definitely holding her now. The disks she'd asked him to hold were resting against her stomach because his arms were wrapped around her, his body was pressed up against her back and now his head was on her shoulder. She wasn't stupid. Something was going on. 

'' Jack?'' she asked, some instinct she didn't know she possessed telling her to use his name. It was probably the third time in her life that she'd ever used it. 

'' Yeah?'' 

'' What are we doing?'' 

'' I don't know. I'm quite tired and my brains not really coping with the fact that you were on a date with McKay tonight.'' 

'' Oh.'' 

'' Yeah.'' He sighed again and this time his warm breath went straight down the front of her dress which did things down low in her body that were definitely against regulations. 

Sam couldn't speak for a moment. '' I thought you'd be pleased. I left the mountain.'' 

'' You went on a date.'' 

'' You're always telling me to get a life.'' 

'' I'd rather you got a life with me.'' 

'' We're not allowed to get a life together.'' 

'' No, we're not allowed to get certain aspects of a life together.'' 

'' Oh.'' 

'' Yeah.'' 

They fell into silence again. Sam would have quite happily stayed there in his arms for the majority of the following day. 

'' I thought you hated him.'' 

'' I don't any more.'' 

'' You mean...'' Jack paused significantly, '' ... you _like_ him.'' 

'' I do, yes. He's a nice man. Funny. He likes me. He's allowed to like me.'' 

Another pause. 

Then, quite suddenly, he pushed all the disks he'd been holding onto one of the many shelves in the cupboard and spun her around. Surprised, she just stood there while he re-wrapped his arms around her and drew her close. They were nearly the same height, he had, perhaps, three or four inches on her, which she'd always liked about him, so it didn't take much of an effort to be able to look into each others eyes with the two inch heals she was wearing. 

She smiled faintly. '' You're being so weird tonight.'' 

He raised his eyebrows and then held her tighter. '' I'm gonna say something here which you're not going to like but you're gonna have to listen to it sometime. Sam, I don't like that you went on a date with someone else. Ah!'' he said when she opened her mouth to hotly reprimand him. '' I know, I know. I'm just saying that's how I feel. I know we're in an impossible situation and I know you have the perfect right to go out and continue your life. I know that. It doesn't change how I feel.'' 

Sam narrowed her eyes. '' What am I supposed to do, then?'' 

'' Come with me to the cabin.'' 

'' No.'' 

'' Why not?'' 

'' Because... we so wouldn't do any fishing.'' 

He grinned. '' Yes, we would.'' 

'' Jack...'' 

'' Look, if given a choice between spending any time with you and not, I chose the first choice. Next time I go, I'll invite Jonas and Teal'c. The whole of SG-1. It'll be a team bonding thing. That safe enough for you?'' 

She frowned. '' It's not going to work.'' 

'' It will if we work at it. And it's not like it's going to be for very long, is it?'' 

'' What do you mean?'' 

Smiling, he kissed the frown creases on her forehead. '' Well, I'm not going to be around here forever. Sooner or later, they're going to retire me, or I'll blow my knee out for the final time. Then I really won't be your CO. As far as I can see, the longest time I could be here would be for another five years.'' 

'' But...'' she started, then realised she didn't have anything to say. '' Five years? That's still a long time.'' 

'' Well, I was kind of hoping you'd get promoted and head your own SG team by then.'' He lightly touched his lips to the middle of her eyebrows. 

If anything, her frown increased, despite the loveliness of his kisses. '' Isn't that up to you?'' 

'' I'm trying not to be biased in any way,'' he pointed out. '' And, anyway, we've already known each other for five years. It doesn't feel like a long time, right?'' 

'' Sometimes it feels like decades.'' She closed her eyes and leaned against him, resting her head on his shoulder. '' But, you're right. I guess I hadn't thought of it like that.'' 

'' I'm so flattered by your impression of my immortality.'' 

Sam giggled, hit him gently. '' Poor McKay.'' 

'' Can I tell him?'' 

'' No!'' 

'' Oh, please, I've been imagining beating him up since he walked into the control room with you. This will be _so_ much better.'' 

'' Jack...'' 

'' I'm liking how easily you got into the name thing.'' 

She snorted. '' Don't change the subject.'' 

He was grinning inanely. '' Aren't we supposed to be fixing the computers?'' 

'' Jack...'' 

'' Funny how you already sound like my wife.'' 

Sam paled. '' Please be kidding me.'' 

'' Jacob made me promise we get married as soon as we were no longer in a direct chain of command. It's really not an option.'' 

'' Oh my God.'' 

He winced. '' I can't believe I just said that.'' He cleared his throat. '' Forget I said that, would you?'' 

Forget he... Well, it was that or spontaneously combust. 


End file.
